The Encyclopedia of Nineteenth-Century Photography is a unique publication, one that is an essential reference work for anyone interested in the medium of photography.

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12.10.2010

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HAAS, PHILIP (ACTIVE 1840s–1860s)German daguerreotypistBorn in Germany around 1808, Philip Haas emigrated to the United States in 1834 and established himself as a lithographer and print publisher in Washington, D.C.When the invention of the daguerreotype was an- nounced in 1839, Haas possibly went directly to Paris to learn the art. Although his earliest documented da- guerreotype is dated March 1843, Haas was still among the first resident daguerreians in the nation’s capital.With his image of John Quincy Adams in 1843, Haas became the first to produce a lithograph directly from a daguerreotype. In 1844, he moved to New York City and established a daguerreian gallery on Broadway. Between 1844 and 1860, he moved up Broadway at least four times.In 1861, at age 53, Haas lied about his age to enlist with the First New York Engineers, which was sent to South Carolina. Here, he was detailed with Washington Peale to shoot photographs. Their most distinctive image shows the USS New Ironsides in action in Charleston Harbor as the smoke from its broadsides trails into the southern sky.Haas apparently was weakened by ill health in 1862. He resigned from the army on May 25, 1863 and from here the trail of his life is lost.

HAES, FRANK (1833–1916)English photographerFrank Haes was born on 3 January 1833 in the Hambro Synagogue, London and died in 1916 in the same city. He first exhibited his photography in 1858 at the age of 25, by which time he had emigrated to Australia and married London-born Adele Valentine in Sydney. The 1858 exhibition of the Photographic Society of London included five of his views of his adopted city.By the early 1860s, the family was back in London, and Haes was earning a reputation as a photographer of stereoscopic views of zoo animals—including what is acclaimed as the first photograph of a living elephant, and rare photographs of a quagga! These stereocards were published by McLean & Haes of 26 Haymarket, London. McLean & Haes also produced cartes de visite, even designing and manufacturing their own four-shot camera specifically for the purpose. A rear-focussing half plate studio camera was designed and marketed by the enlarged partnership of McLean, Melhuish & Haes in the later 1860s.At the International Exhibition of 1862, McLean & Haes achieved awards for their ‘coloured photographs,’ and two years later they wrote to W.H.F Talbot to ar- range to photograph Talbot as part of a series they were creating of Fellows of the Royal Society. When the 1901 Jewish Encyclopedia was published, Haes was acknowledged as one of those who had provided illustrations.

HALE, LUTHER HOLMAN (1823–1885)American daguerreotypistLuther Holman Hale, one of Boston’s better known daguerreian artists, was listed with a gallery there from 1845 to 1862. He was born September 21, 1823, in Milbury, Massachusetts, and apparently first went into business with his brother, C. E., on Milk Street in Boston before opening his own gallery.From 1846 to 1850, with Benjamin French as a partner, Hale did business at the L. H. Hale & Co. Daguerreotype Miniature Rooms at 109 Washington Street, advertising: “Miniatures taken in any weather, with or without colors, in a superior style, and neatly set in Lockets, Pins, Rings, Bracelets, or Cases.” The firm also sold daguerreian materials.From 1850 to 1857, Hale continued at the same address alone before listing G. A. Ayling as a partner in 1858 and 1859. Hale also taught the daguerreotype process and perhaps his best-known student was Wil- liam Herman Rulofson, one of the first great American western photographers. He continued to be listed in Boston through 1862.Hale died in 1885 and his personal collection of fam- ily daguerreotypes is preserved today at the American Antiquarian Society in Worchester, Mass.

HALF-TONE PRINTINGHalf-tone is a widely used photomechanical printing process where a photographic image is translated onto the printed page as a fine pattern of dots. The dot pattern is so fine that the individual dots cannot be seen by the naked eye. Rather the naked eye blurs the dot pattern into an image that appears to have the quality of a photo- graph. The dot pattern can be seen under magnification. Half-tone was an important invention as it provided an effective process for commercial printers to mass print photographically realistic images. Invented in the 19th century it still commonly used today in commercial printing. It is often referred to as the screen process or dot process.Before the half-tone process, the pages of newspapers and magazines did not contain the photographically realistic images that we take for granted today. The most common type of picture in a newspaper was a woodcut or wood-engraving. These prints, made from hand carved blocks of wood, could not produce the minute details and subtle tones of a photograph. While often attractive, these prints more resemble hand drawn sketches.Since the invention of photography, commercial printers wanted a practical way to realistically reproduce photographs onto the printed page. The essential prob- lem lay in the fact that the most common mechanical printing processes can only print areas of ink or leave blank areas on the paper. They could print different tones. A newspaper press could only print black or nothing. Photographs, on the other hand, have a range of tone, meaning there are various shades of gray be- tween black and white. This is what gives photographs realistic images. While there were earlier mechanical printing processes that could imitate the tone and subtle details of a photograph, most notably the Woodburytype, these processes were expensive, difficult to make, and not practical for mass commercial printing that used relief printing.The half-tone process overcame these limitations, offering a practical process that could create near pho- tographically realistic images. The half-tone process translates the tones and detail of a photographic image into a printed pattern of tiny dots or similar marks. With a magnifying glass these dots can be seen. Examination of a photographically realistic picture in a modern news- paper or magazine reveals the half-tone dots. Though it was later applied to a variety of printing processes, its initial triumph was that it could be applied to relief printing, which was the staple of the book, newspaper and other periodical industry.The traditional half-tone process in relief is as fol- lows: First, a negative is made by taking a picture of the desired item through a special screen. Sometimes a glass with crossed lines is used instead of a screen. The screen breaks up the illuminated image into a pattern of dots on the negative. The lightest areas of the object create large dots close to each other. The darkest areas of the object create smaller dots further part. The nega- tive is then used to expose the printing plate that has a photographically sensitive coating. The dots sizes are reversed on the printing plate. This means that the largest dots on the negative become the smallest on the printing plate, and vise versa. The printing plate is developed, the unexposed areas are washed away, and the plate is etched. The finished printing plate has the dot pattern in relief (raised from the rest of the plate). During printing, ink is placed on the raised dots, which is translated into a pattern of dots on the printed page. Depending on the fineness of the screen used, there will be more or fewer dots per inch in the print. The more dots per inch, the higher the quality of the image. On rough paper, such as newspaper, fewer dots per inch are necessary. On fine paper, more dots per inch are best.The first half-tone print in a newspaper appeared in 1880. By the 1890s, many newspapers and magazines had half-tone images.Half-tone applied to intaglio printing is called pho- togravure. Photogravure has a similar dot pattern, but the ink is deposited in different amounts. In the dark areas of the image, where the ink is the heaviest, the ink is physically raised from the paper. This quality is observed under a microscope. Photogravure could cre- ate quality images, but not lettering. Half-tone could be applied to lithography in the 19th century, but was not widely used in commercial printing until the 20th century. Today, most newspapers, magazines and other commercial prints use lithography.Color Half-tone. Half-tone printing is often tinted or colored by printing solid colors onto the black half-tone print. Sometimes, a black and white half-tone print is hand tinted (2 additional colors) or hand colored (3 or more colors). To make a true color half-tone, printing plates are made, each for a different color. In the 19th and early 20th century, the colors were red, blue, yel- low and often black. Today, the common colors are cyan (light blue), magenta (darkish-purple), yellow and black. To make the negative, the object is photographed four times through a half-tone screen and through filters that eliminate all colors from each negative except for the desired color. When printed successively on top of each other, the resulting has the realistic color. If you examine a color picture in a magazine with a magnifying glass or microscope, you will see that the image is made of a made dots of different color. True color half-tone relief printing was introduced in the 1890s, though it did not produce quality color pictures until the turn of the century. In this printing, black ink was not used until the 20th century. Instead, the red, blue and yellow were printed on top of each other to achieve black. Color half-tone lithography was not commercially successful until the 20th century.